Wang proposes and applies an innovative analytical framework to study the institutional continuity and changes in China. More specifically, this study examines and explains the peculiar premodernity and the profound modernization process of China. On the track of a state-led modernization, the dragon of China is found to be institutionally entering the nets of the market economy. An inquiry of China's labour allocation patterns and their changes serves as the indicator for the institutional analysis.

Autorentext

Fei-Ling Wang is Assistant Professor at the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs, Georgia Institute of Technology.

Inhalt

List of Tables and Figures Preface Acknowledgements List of Abbreviations Institutions, Institutional Changes and Modernization: A Conceptual Framework Modernization: The Arguments Human Needs, Behaviours and Institutions: An Institutional Approach to the Study of Modernization An Institutional Understanding of Modernity and Modernization Timing and Other Remaining Methodological Issues Summary Notes A Theory on the Patterns of Labour Allocation Labour Allocation Patterns: The Notion The Ideal Types of LAP Summary Notes A Historical Review of the Chinese Domestic Organizational Structure: A Peculiar Premodernity Labour Allocation in China: From Qin to Qing (Third Century B.C.- Nineteenth Century A.D.) The Era of Changes (1840-1949) Leaping Forward to the Past (1949-1978) The Chinese Premodernity: Messages from the Reading of History Summary Notes Institutional Reconfiguration: Labour Allocation Patterns and Chinese Modernization To Observer Chinese Modernization: Assertions and Hypotheses Mixed LAPs in the 1990s: Institutional Continuities and Changes Summary Notes Conclusion: the Dragon Enters the Nets Institutions and Institutional Changes: To Understand Modernization To Emerge from Premodernity: China and the Chinese Modernization The Dragon in the Nets: An Epilogue Notes Appendix. A Methodological Discussion on Chinese Statistical Data Bibliography Index